Robert Jenrick has been sacked

Alistair Campbell is as far l

Iam64

No one could deny Starmer has presided over awful comms and appeared unable to establish support from back benchers before announcing proposals he must have known were controversial.
Sadly, we do have a press media that doesn’t just lean slightly right . The government’s good work isn’t publicised. Where’s an Alexander Campbell type to ensure better coverage

Starmer is miles away from being the worst PM. He has integrity and his work internationally is important

I think you mean Alistair Campbell. 🤣🤣. Better coverage? He is as far left as it’s possible to be and as mad as a box of frogs.

Casdon

PMQ has not been shortened by Starmer incidentally. It has been a 30 minute scheduled session on Wednesdays, since 1997, when it was changed from two 15 minute sessions on different days.
This thread has been quite the eye opener I think, people are free with comments about Starmer, but many of those people haven’t actually commented about what they think about Jenrick’s defection - is that too uncomfortable to discuss?

Well spotted. I wonder where that came from? Blair did switch the timing of PMQs, but it still doesn’t give enough room for real, in-depth conversation.

Would you agree that the format itself is a big part of the issue? I wish they had never broadcast PMQs. Other than the odd amazing speech, I doubt things were any better in the past.

We get so much more from the Select Committees but they are not blown up in the way PMQs is. As I understand it before Margaret Thatcher began the convention of answering nearly all questions herself, prior to they were passed to Ministers.

Sadly, the Starmer attacks read more as frustration than an argument I can really engage with. Claims like “worst PM ever” are so absolute that they don’t leave much room for discussion.

If you want to talk about specific policies, decisions, or outcomes, I’m happy to do that. I just find broad character judgments and vague references to popularity less useful for a meaningful discussion.

Iam64

Casdon, why discuss the defection of yet another failed conservative when you can ignore this serious problem and simply repeat negative beliefs about Starmer

Absolutely!

Any opportunity to criticise Keir Starmer … on a thread that has nothing to do with Keir Starmer🤷‍♀️

Casdon, why discuss the defection of yet another failed conservative when you can ignore this serious problem and simply repeat negative beliefs about Starmer

PMQ has not been shortened by Starmer incidentally. It has been a 30 minute scheduled session on Wednesdays, since 1997, when it was changed from two 15 minute sessions on different days.
This thread has been quite the eye opener I think, people are free with comments about Starmer, but many of those people haven’t actually commented about what they think about Jenrick’s defection - is that too uncomfortable to discuss?

Thanks DAR.

I see Farage an an attention-seeking agitator, someone who likes to be controversial for the sake of it, not someone who could ever buckle down to the hard daily graft of being PM especially the international diplomatic role. He can’t even buckle down to the hard graft of being a constituency MP. His arrogance prevents him from doing so.

The recent media coverage of his behavour when at school shows who he was then and who he is now. A deeply unpleasant troublemaker.

Nor does he have the broad political knowledge or interest in the wide range of issues that a PM needs to have. Immigration, immigration, immigration isn’t going to cut it. Over a year and half in Parliament and his contribution has been minimal.

He’s happiest in front of a camera whether it’s a tent rally, self-promoting press conferences, after dinner speeches to extremists, GB News, making childish videos for Cameo or flogging gold bullion. He’d have to give all that up and get down to some serious hard graft managing a cabinet of ministers with little or no experience. The only person he now has on board with any experience of real government is Jenrick whose own career to date isn’t exactly bathed in glory.

He’d be head of an absolute shambles. A new government has to hit the ground running. Whatever anyone thinks of Labour, they began with a team of people with considerable shadow experience.

The next GE has to be held by 15 August 2029. The latest that any parliament can be dissolved is “the beginning of the day that is the fifth anniversary of the day on which it first met”, with the election to be held 25 working days after that. It first met on 9 July 2024. Would we have an August election? I doubt it. I may be wrong but I think the last time there was an August election was in the 19C so lets assume the next one is in July 2029. It leaves very little time for ministers who do have shadow experience to get into gear before summer recess and conference season and before the Autumn Statement needs to be delivered, let alone a bunch of greenhorns obsessed with immigration.

I’m betting that he will be long gone by then and that Reform, which is built solely on the cult of his unpleasant personality will collapse - if not sooner through in-fighting or an attempted coup from Jenrick.

No one could deny Starmer has presided over awful comms and appeared unable to establish support from back benchers before announcing proposals he must have known were controversial.
Sadly, we do have a press media that doesn’t just lean slightly right . The government’s good work isn’t publicised. Where’s an Alexander Campbell type to ensure better coverage

Starmer is miles away from being the worst PM. He has integrity and his work internationally is important

Starmer is absolutely the worst PM ever. He is dull and boring. he has nothing about him whatsoever. He cares more about people in other countries than Brits. He flip flops and does U Turns all the time. He is extremely unpopular according to polls, phone ins and TV progs. Even people who had high hopes for him are disappointed.

I watch PMQ too, and my perception of Starmer’s performance is very different to eazybee’s. How are you qualified to say who is right, exactly Mollygo? The reality is we all have different perceptions, of him, of Jenrick, of the different parties. However, this thread is about Jenrick.

eazybee

I watch. Starmer in action at PMQ, and generally am astonished at how poor his frequently rude responses are. As a lawyer I expected him to be a fluent and persuasive speaker with facts and figures at his fingertips; he clearly is not, and appears to resent the temerity of MPs asking him questions. Witness the reduction of time for PMQs.
I have no insider information as to the conduct of government, as some posters believe they do. I write as an ordinary member of the electorate viewing with increasing alarm the mess Starmer is making of government.

Since we were frequently told about KS’ qualifications for the post of party leader, your expectations of his ability to be a fluent and persuasive speaker with facts and figures at his fingertips is not unreasonable.

The desperate defence of KS that we see implies that others are also concerned about that, but are unwilling to admit it.

If Parliament had an OFSTED type inspection, he certainly wouldn’t fare very well.

I’m not sure PMQT has actually been shortened. Didn’t Tony Blair switch ye timing around back when he was PM?
It’s timing certainly doesn’t allow for any in depth questions.

Do any politicians care about this country and its people? To me it doesn’t feel like they do. It seems to be in party fighting, telling lies and taxing us on what little we have and nothing to show for it. I live in hope that things will change for the better.

Reply to Graphite re Sun 18-Jan-26 11:36:11 post

That has to one of the few times I've felt really part of a discussion. Thank you. I do think calling a by-election in the circumstances we are talking about would be democratic but sadly I also agree that it's unlikely.

Your quote could apply to all the would be authoritarians. It's hits the nail very firmly on the head but I must admit I hadn't thought about him not actually wanting the PMs job. He does seem more personally aware than Trump so you could well be right.

eazybee

I watch. Starmer in action at PMQ, and generally am astonished at how poor his frequently rude responses are. As a lawyer I expected him to be a fluent and persuasive speaker with facts and figures at his fingertips; he clearly is not, and appears to resent the temerity of MPs asking him questions. Witness the reduction of time for PMQs.
I have no insider information as to the conduct of government, as some posters believe they do. I write as an ordinary member of the electorate viewing with increasing alarm the mess Starmer is making of government.

I find myself reading comments like this less as an assessment of government, and more as an expression of disappointment that politics isn’t providing the kind of performance people expect. PMQs is designed to reward quick jibes and theatre, not careful explanation, and those who excel at it are not always those best suited to repairing a country in the state this one was left in.

Starmer inherited a UK weakened by Brexit and more than two decades of Conservative policy choices. He does cite figures and constraints, but if someone has already decided not to listen, no amount of data will land. That’s not the same as facts not being there.

I’m also unclear what the reference to “insider information” adds. You say you’re writing as an ordinary voter, which most of us are. That seems a sufficient standpoint on its own.

I’d much rather have a discussion about priorities, trade-offs and outcomes than reduce everything to tone or perceived rudeness. Politics is difficult enough without turning it into a spectator sport.

Why is a thread about Jenrick’s sacking now about Starmer?

Back to Jenrick.

DAR - yours yesterday 16:22. Fair enough.

I brought up PR as a side issue to the main discussion only because as someone with left of centre politics living in what was always a safe Tory seat … until it changed hands in 2024, I had felt unrepresented by the constituency MP in Westminster for over 40 years. And that’s the same for the vast majority of voters while we persist with FPTP.

Repeating myself I know, but the notion of people complaining because two Tories have moved along the benches to sit with a four former Tories doesn’t seem that big a deal as by-elections will make no difference whatsoever in this current Parliament.

Nor will petitions. 100,000 signatures might trigger a debate but if there was a division, Labour would just whip its MPs to vote for the status quo.

Nevertheless, I do understand the general desire for a by-election when an MP crosses the floor because in rare cases it can make a difference - as when Phillip Lee crossed the floor to the LibDems in 2019 and the Tories lost their working majority.

A reminder of the stage-managed drama while Johnson was speaking.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/sep/03/phillip-lee-quits-tories-leaving-government-without-a-majority

If only Jenrick had thought of that before he was sacked.

Farage himself demanded a by-election when Christian Wakeford crossed from Tory to Labour in 2022. If Farage was true to that conviction, as party leader he would be insisting that Kruger and Jenrick go to the polls.

He claimed, when criticising Wakeford, that people vote for a party leader not the candidate. So is Farage frightened to put his own popularity to the test especially while his American idol is doing his best to start WW3 and civil war at home?

I don’t believe for one minute that Farage wants to be PM. Like all narcissists, his biggest fear is of being exposed as a fraud. He’d soon be found incapable of doing the job. I suspect others know it too especially Jenrick. Despite all the revolting brown-toothed gurning at the press conference, I thought Farage looked shaken although it could have been the speed at which it all happened after Badenoch forced the pace.

Much as I loathe Rupert Lowe, he had a point when the said:

“You’ve got to look at the pattern of relationships with Nigel throughout his career … Almost anybody who is in his view either threatening him or is capable enough to take over from him, he tends to fall out with them.”

Jenrick is just as loathsome but he does have senior government experience and could be a real threat to Farage’s dictatorship.

Of course, this could all be part of Farage’s long term exit strategy so he never has to be put to the test and can claim he was the greatest PM the country never had.

I’m buying popcorn for the next episode of Rats in a Sack.

I watch. Starmer in action at PMQ, and generally am astonished at how poor his frequently rude responses are. As a lawyer I expected him to be a fluent and persuasive speaker with facts and figures at his fingertips; he clearly is not, and appears to resent the temerity of MPs asking him questions. Witness the reduction of time for PMQs.
I have no insider information as to the conduct of government, as some posters believe they do. I write as an ordinary member of the electorate viewing with increasing alarm the mess Starmer is making of government.

Not my morning! no now.

Sorry, I pressed the button too soon.

It’s not as if the country stops running because the PM is abroad for a few days. Government, Parliament, and departments carry on with domestic policy regardless. If anything, pretending international engagement doesn’t matter anymore just shows a lack of awareness of how interconnected politics is no

Some of the previous comments feel like a very old-fashioned take on what a PM actually does. Like it or not, the UK isn’t operating in a vacuum, especially after Brexit. Rebuilding relationships, trade links, and trust with allies doesn’t happen over Zoom or from Westminster alone.

Calling it “photo opportunities” ignores how diplomacy works. A lot of it is about being present, having conversations, and being taken seriously again. Those meetings don’t produce instant headlines, but they do shape outcomes over time.

Stamer is doing what any responsible PM should do. He's representing the UK in International affairs that directly affect the security and economic prosperity of the country. He'd be criticised if he was not doing this.

Well, if it was started by Johnson, the Lying King, that says it all.

Susieq62

Sundown girl I have seen him at almost every PMQT so he is in the country for Wednesday !!!
Plus a world leader has to represent their country surely for specific events? I mean he didn’t go to FIFA for a peace prize did he ??
Doesn’t a PM delegate work to his cabinet ministers as do most heads of organisations delegate to heads of departments ! Just an observation

Exactly, this ‘never here Keir’ is a myth that is being perpetuated on social media along with the myth that he constantly lies and has broken all Labour’s manifesto pledges. I have challenged people on social media to give examples of the lies and broken manifesto promises and they either don’t reply or give responses that indicate they have no idea what was in the Labour manifesto. Another myth that is being perpetuated about him is that he failed to prosecute Jimmy Savile, that one was started by Boris Johnson.

Don't really care...lol More worried about Trump and Greenland etc

eazybee

Starmer achieves little at these meetings except a collection of photographs shaking important people's hand.
There must be someone in the labour Party with a talent for world affairs, and understanding of the underlying politics, and the ability to work with others rather than simply toadying up to them.
I cannot think of anyone but then I have little knowledge of the Labour party apart from the doleful front bench, but I suspect Starmer does not encourage brains about him; they would show him up.

So do you have inside information about what goes on behind the political international photo shoots to prove that all Starmer is doing is shaking hands and having his photo taken? Maybe diplomacy does look, on the surface, as toadying up to people.